The Sandwich Generation -
Two young daughters,my parents,
two dogs, and a job working with older adults...I am living a sandwich life between the young and old! Evidently that wasn't enough, so I have added 9 chickens too! Update! 15 chickens!

Monday, July 18, 2011

No chance of it getting to be too quiet!

About the time that I am sure that things have calmed down and we can really begin to enjoy the summer, a series of things begin to unravel and you spend countless hours trying to "fix" it!

Recently our desktop would not boot up. The $75 I had spent for updated virus prevention software was evidently not enough. I tried for hours and days to download (or is it upload) something else but right as it was completing, it would shut itself down.

I finally gave up and called a repair person, who had come highly recommended. He showed up that afternoon and in a matter of 4 or so hours, had cleared out all the problems, downloaded new and improved virus protection, and I think replaced the hard drive, but once he got to a description of the problems all I could hear was something that sounded like Charlie Brown's teacher, "Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah!". So $180 later and it is fixed!

I knew my laptop was having problems but kept thinking I had fixed it (again that word) and hated to think how much more I would owe him so we put it off for another time.

Of course, almost immediately mine began to display the same issues as the desktop. I hoped it was a 24 hour bug but of course it is much worse.

I'm still waiting on the repair person to contact me so I am without my usual computer.

At the same time I had been attending a conference in a town about 25 miles from us, which was 25 miles more than what I wanted to drive, but the conference was good and I was glad for the change in scenery, as well as the opportunity to learn something new.

On the very last day of the conference I stopped by the restroom before braving the 100+ temperatures and the long drive home. Without a thought, I dropped my car keys into my conference bag that looked just like all the other conference bags. I had left my purse at home, accidentally but carry anything important with my phone, so I had decided not to turn around and return for it. The first of many mistakes for the day!

When I came out of the stall, I washed my hands, and bent to pick up my bag to get my keys ready so I could start that a/c as quickly as possible!

Hmmm, I don't remember bringing a black jacket.

Hmmm, I don't own a black jacket.

Wait a minute! This is not my bag.

I immediately dig through everything in the bag still expecting to find my keys, as well as the bottle of cranberry juice I had left from the refreshments (which is a sure sign that I am getting old: taking the juice for one thing, the other that it was cranberry).

I run out of the restroom with the bag in hand and stand there with my mouth wide open wanting to scream for everyone to stop where they are! Instead I start asking anyone and everyone if they had been in the restroom and gotten my bag by mistake.

When that didn't work, then I positioned myself by the doors so I could stop each person leaving if they had my keys.

Of course the question begs, why didn't I just get someone from home to bring me the other set?? BUT the problem is, I only have 1 set!

After calling my co-worker to come back and rescue me, a tow truck was finally secured, and my car was brought home once more. I was sure that the person who had taken my bag would finally figure out they had someone else's bag and send my keys back so I could avoid the $400 cost of re-keying my car.

It's good to work with someone who is able to help out with all sorts of problems and soon an email went out to ALL the participants and within hours my keys were found.

Thankfully Dad did not mind loaning his HUGE truck to us so Grace and I were able to make it to the 12:01 AM showing of Harry Potter.

Sometime in the midst of all of these things happening, Annabel decided that both dogs were sick and we had to get them to the vet. $175 later, the dogs are both on the mend, which was about the time I got a call from the Golden Retriever Rescue group, where I had signed up for us to be a foster family.

Annabel has wanted a Golden Retriever since the first time she saw one and while I put her off at Christmas with the suggestion that summer is a much better time to get a dog, I was now faced with the need to make a good decision on adding to our family.

The foster program seemed ideal as it would allow all of us enough time to decide if a third dog would work. Our dogs are pretty sure they do not need a pet, but the rescue group thought we would be perfect for fostering and less than 24 hours later, we added Charley to our group.

The jury is still out on whether Charley is a permanent addition. I will keep you updated.

Now to my more recent irritant.

While trying to get the new dog in the house I lost my phone. I kept knowing I needed to make sure I had not left it somewhere, but our house was in quite a state last night with all 3 dogs squaring off and the girls trying to keep peace, so my phone was not a priority.

It always comes down to Annabel to find it for me and when she did I found I had several strange posts on my blog and in my in box where hackers had been doing there work.

Ugh! I hope you did not click on the links that showed earlier today. If I knew how to lose weight or how to get a better life, I would not post them for free on this blog! I would be out there trying to do an infomercial selling it!